Twitter has come a long way since its humble beginnings way back in 2006. Almost ten years later and they will be soon to implement an instant buy button, it’s true. Twitter officially confirmed this when they stated in their blog that users will be able to get access to merchandise right in the Twitter app.

Using Shopify

Twitter is looking to integrate Shopify into their site to create this element of e-commerce. This would effectively connect their already obtained 100,000 merchants directly to the Twitter audience. Twitter isn’t the only one doing this, however. In other reports, it looks like both Pinterest and Facebook are all working with Shopify in beta tests for their own buy buttons.

Buying over social the future?

Although the data on whether or not people want to buy off social media platforms is limited, it seems this competition on building a buy button is forging ahead nonetheless. Initially, it looks like these companies are using flawed logic because small merchants without a previously strong following on social sites won’t find this selling method especially lucrative.

This new requirement to build a following to be profitable on social might just be the point, though. As we all know Social Media has become somewhat of a best practice for all brands to build awareness in customer’s minds and engage with their audience. With the added ability to sell directly in addition to being able to build brand awareness/engagement, social media as a whole will be a lot more important to businesses, especially retailers. The initial gain comes after the first brand actually does it successfully first, though. Through this first mover advantage, huge gains in popularity and user rate will inevitably ensue. The race we’re seeing between Facebook and Twitter is the most notable, with Pinterest not far behind.

So what does this mystical “buy button” look like?

Of course, they look a tad similar. Let’s see what the buy interface looks like, though.

Nearly everything on the Facebook buyer interface is available on Amazon except for the shipping address and social icons, of course. So, what does this mean? Well, no one knows anything for sure, but some intense competition between Amazon and Facebook or Amazon and Twitter is definitely a possibility. Most likely, the huge conglomerate that we know as Amazon has their eye on this but isn’t feeling too threatened by these novice “internet-retailing social sites”.

Where is this all going?

With the implementation of these Buy Buttons, it seems that social media will definitely be increasing their value to large and small merchants alike. As Twitter progresses with Shopify, the competition between who develops it properly first definitely looks to be intensifying. Much remains to be seen in the future with this button, but this has potential to be a major game changer.

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